G.I. Joe - Cobra v1 #1-4

As a part of the 2008 IDW "GI Joe" relaunch, the company published a mini-series focusing on the updated take on the terrorist Cobra organization. The series follows the undercover mission of Chuckles, an existing character whose mission is depicted in a manner similar to Wildstorm's "Sleeper". Thus, writers Gage and Costa underplay the more outrageous elements of the property, settling for a take that is much closer to modern spy fiction.

Antonio Fuso's depiction of the protagonist likewise dispenses with the bulkier physique and keeps only the blonde hair and the occasional Hawaiian shirt of the original. Fuso's Chuckles is slim and tense, in keeping with the gravity of his mission. He is also a very smart character, aware of the risks that accompany his status as a double agent.

IDW does not shy away from depicting his assignments as the dirtiest black ops missions, but most of the gory details are hidden from the reader. These original four issues cover a lot of ground, from his initiation to an unknown terrorist organization, to his advancement in the Cobra hierarchy, to the eventual final confrontation with his leaders, but the pacing is intentionally detached and murky. Gage and Costa use the captions to provide a closer look into the psyche of a man enduring such a soul shredding assignment, which is why the book works as well as it does.

If not for a sympathetic main character, that is equal parts manipulating and self-destructive, these four issues could easily have become an exercise in a drab and pointless misreading of the material. Updating a franchise that is so over the top as G.I. Joe is an undertaking that is best taken with a somewhat lighter focus, but the creators manage to achieve a significant degree of nuance.

"G.I. Joe - Cobra" is still by and large an action spectacle, but there is a feeling that the creators are pushing the envelope. Chuckles' relationship with women from both sides of the divide likewise refuses to comply with the familiar genre cliches. The deep cover agent's feelings for Jinx are more or less the compass that he holds on to when faced with repeated requests that challenge his humanity, but the affair he strikes with a woman in the Cobra organization feels more than a simple manipulation on his part.

There is a real feeling that the physicality of it is helping him deal with the day to day stress, instead of a chance to spice up the story with hints of erotica. Fuso is certainly not the artist to objectify the female form, as his artwork aims for a much seedier, detached effect. The artist is trying for a modern, more sedate style of artists such as Michael ("Alias") Gaydos and even Andrea ("I, Vampire") Sorrentino, but his style is clearly still developing. The paired down pages offer a nice grasp on layouts and pacing, but there is a definite lack of definition throughout.

The colorist is thus employed to provide more than the atmosphere with his work. Despite the shortcomings, Fuso exhibits an affinity for the material, that succeeds in so small part thanks to his strengths as a storyteller. The chapters provided glimpses into crucial events in Chuckles' mission, but are otherwise separated by a few months, enabling the writers to cover a lot of ground in only four installments.

Thus, the reader is left to sympathize with the protagonist and his plight, without losing focus on unrelated missions and the divergent plots needed to maintain the formula indefinitely. The final chapter has Chuckles bringing his mission to an end, only to come into a specific set of storytelling limitations. It's telling that only the last chapter prominently names Cobra as the threat, and identifies several of his bosses by name. The protagonist may have been running away from the franchise that he was created for, but in the end the wider concerns of line-wide continuity, and ironically, the success of the three issues preceding it, paint a very inconclusive end.

Having spent three and a half issues setting up the terrorist organization with an agenda that has some real world relevance, Chuckles' plan to sabotage the operation includes intelligent robots and is ultimately threatened by twin masterminds and comic book villain logic. In reasserting the dominance of the recurring Cobra characters, Gage and Costa simply go too far, weakening the conclusion. As the closing editorial suggests, the company was already making plans for the series' continuation, and further integration into the "G. I. Joe" line.

"Sleeper", the series' obvious inspiration, was thankfully allowed a greater degree of independence from the Wildstorm continuity, but it also had to fight an uphill battle to avoid cancellation. It certainly speaks to IDW's ingenuity that the company has found a way to keep the "G. I. Joe - Cobra" book alive in a market that is nothing if not hostile to tertiary licensed titles.

Spooks

Devil's Due is an interesting publisher. Most of their line consists of licensed or licensable properties that work in the similar vein, that of updating the Saturday Morning cartoons for an audience that is more mature. Thus, the titles feel fresh and happy to channel the video-game violence in hope of ending up adapted as a Hollywood action flick.

And that's pretty much the deal with Spooks, yet another Devil's Due publishing title that has pretty much flew under the radar of most of the fans and critics. It has apparently sold enough copies to warrant an ongoing series, and that's what's finally got me to check out the mini-series the concept originally debuted in.

Now, Spooks' autorship is a very complicated thing. It's apparently an idea of Ryan Schifrin and Daniel Alter, who thought it would be cool to envision the movie that mixes Larry Hamma's GI Joes fighting RA Salvatore's RPG monsters. And yet, the creators decided it's best to hold on to embelisshing the movie script and just send the concept over to Hamma and Salvatore to develop as a comic. Hamma accepted the job of co-scripting the book with Schifrin, no doubt in order to have it presented to the Hollywood producers as soon as possible, and Salvatore (with his brother, Geno Salvatore, even!) ended up briefly summing up the way he saw some of the monsters could be used for good effect. Add Adam Archer, a quick, up-and-coming aritst to the mix, and you've got a Devil's Due series, fast and furious, as it tries to capture everyone's attention.

Getting into the story is easy, as the principal players are quickly introduced, and everything is set up for the action sequences, that are at the heart of the story. The characters are easy to distinguish, their personalities as simple and quick to grasp as their code names. There is even a hint of romance with the introduction of a female soldier, but make no mistake, she's mostly there to tease the audience and smooth up the breaks between the showdowns with monsters. As for the villains, they are even less distinctive, and except for some contrived ties to the heroes' pasts, defined solely by their bestial nature.

The story takes some twists and turns, as the soldiers of yet another S.H.I.E.L.D. knockoff agency (complete with a witty and quickly-forgettable acronym), sporting familiar blue jumpsuits reveal themselves as ready for anything, battle-scarred anti-heroes. After numerous takes on this post-Aliens and Starship Troopers idea, the whole thing seems very campy and tired.

The rushed and not quite ready for the prime time artwork certainly doesn't help endear the series to new readers, but it's at least clear in depicting numerous complicated battlefield scenarios. Some of the variant covers are very nice to look at, though, and it's a real shame that DDP didn't pare up Schifrin and Hamma with an artist who would depict these characters and their world in a slicker way in this, its introduction to the audience.

On the other hand, the writers take the whole thing seriously, and manage to help tie the project into a coherent tale. "Spooks" does not aspire to experimentation with the form and structure of sequential art, it's a concept that's by chance premiered in the comics form, as it tries to communicate its take on monster hunting to the readers. It's not novel in any way, and certainly doesn't distinguish itself enough to fulfill its goals in the first mini-series, but the writers help make it into a real story, one that's readable and entertaining.

The most glaring problem is that it simply does not have a lot going for it. From the beginning to the end you get GI Joe fighting the undead, and little else that is new or unique. The book tries to divert the readers' attention by introducing us to the secret government organization and characters from its Alpha and Beta teams that already have some history with each other, even setting up the black-ops Omega division, that has since become the star of the ongoing series. Yet, all that aside, it reamins the sum of its parts, ie. the story about army grunts trying to stop a zombie apocalypse, brought on by a sorcerer a mad-on for humans.

Arguably, the book works best when dealing with little details, such as the arms and equipment used to fight supernatural, and some of the action sequences do come off as fun and unusual. The focus on the main characters doesn't succeed as much, though, and they remain little more than cyphers, occasionally trying for melodrama, but mostly resorting to sprouting one-liners in the middle of the fight. Perhaps using the standard 6-issue story arc would have helped the book utilize more space for developing its ideas.

To sum it up, I'm not sure that the set up like this fits for an action movie it so desperately wants to be. I see a lot of a generic video-game in it, what with it's heavy focus on short bursts of formulaic story spliced between all the gory fights. Despite the cliches and overall blandness of the whole thing, the irony is that it could work as an ongoing series. DDP did not make a mistake by going forwards with the ongoing series, because some of its concepts could benefit with a lot of space for re-tinkering and development that a monthly provides.